3 out of 5

Label: Big Scary Monsters

Produced by: Mark Roberts, Alpha Male Tea Party

My brain is breaking with how to review this, because I… really dislike parts of it, but I guess / I think reviews are supposed to be a bit more objective than just “this isn’t what I wanted,” but also: how else are we supposed to review music?

So in these scenarios, I have to fall back on trying to determine if this what the general audience for a band or artist wants, or depending on my perception of the goals of the release, whether or not it fulfills those goals. And if I’m completely lost, I’ll go searching other reviews or writeups for background, which, with Alpha Male Tea Party’s Reptilian Brain, still leaves me quite confused: am I listening to the same album as everyone else?

You can see I landed on a safe 3 out of 5, because I can’t deny these songs are well composed, and there are a choice few I enjoy (primarily at the album’s start), and it’s not like AMTP went so left field as to no longer be the same band, and thus ol’ magnanimous me is allowing for some wiggle room on my negativity and letting the rating drift in “it’s good” territory.

AMTP, primarily an instrumental math-rock act, went full vocals for their fifth release. That’s not an automatic exclusion: while admittedly I have few examples of when that addition works, I think it’s always an interesting idea to entertain, and even if they are only a few – sometimes it does work. But let me ask you a question: when does math rock just become pop music? I’m sure some genre expert and people who understand time signatures can ‘splain it to me, but until then, I think if you define anything from Minus the Bear after Highly Refined Pirates as math rock, we’ll be split on our takes, and you’ll probably enjoy Reptilian Brain. Thus I think mine ears are offended not directly by the vocals (which Tom Peters, singing, and Ben Griffiths, shouting, do very effectively), and moreso that this is a fucking pop rock album in the vein of MTB, with some proggy, arena-sized dynamics a la Mars Volta, and emo-pop like My Chemical Romance. If it was especially catchy, or especially original pop – MTB, MCR and MV can claim those values for their work – but… I dunno, I just feel like I’ve heard most of the melodies on Brain before, and the few moments when the band dips back into the more complex instrumental interplay of their past are too fleeting for me to celebrate. At best, that can be a homogenized mainstream sound like Cave In’s Antenna – a pretty great album with great riffs; something like ‘(I’m Operatin’ On) Feel Alone’ gets close to that, here – but for the majority of this disc, I was cringing through surface-level narratives that didn’t justify that lyrical layer, and some well-produced tunes that lacked memorable hooks.

What’s frustrating is that a more (to me) successful balance is on display for the first few tracks. While ‘Probably Just Hungry’s lyrics are the cringiest of the cringe (really, we’re just gonna talk about being hangry?), it’s a good pop riff, and I love the way it’s shoved between two harder songs. Scumbag Alliance is even better, with a very glammy chorus that’s a fun and surprising offset to its music. Had the album continued juggling the shiner stuff with some punk / rock, I think I’d be on board, but literally from that point on… it’s just the pop stuff, with a “remember when?” chugga chugga riff thrown in here and there. ‘Sniper’s Dream’ briefly sounds like modern day Tub Ring at least, so that’s okay. (But, ahem, AMTP are not Tub Ring, just as they’re not the other bands mentioned.)

I understand this isn’t the first time AMTP did singing, and I… respect the commitment to it: if they had just tried to add vocals on top of their existing sound, it wouldn’t have fit. But the changeup clearly does very little for me. However, if your listening diet contains the acronymed-bands I called out, and doesn’t go much deeper than that – I say, truly without shade: depending on when we all grew up, and which band you heard first sets you on whichever musical path – then AMTP’s Reptilian Brain is probably another good variation to try out, and could be an introduction into their math-rockier past.